WEST Dorset MP Oliver Letwin will not stand at the next election, he has revealed.

He made the announcement this morning, saying he will retire in 2020 to spend more time with his family.

Asides from the announcement, Mr Letwin said he did not want to make any further comment.

There are unofficial reports that one possibility is his seat could be carved up in to three parts and absorbed in to neighbouring constituencies in a review by the Boundary Commission. 

A spokesman said no details can be given at this time, but an official announcement of changes will be made on September 12. 

The news comes just days after he was dropped from the Cabinet by new Prime Minister Theresa May.

Mr Letwin has been West Dorset MP since 1997.

He was Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster from 2014 to 2016.

Following the 2015 general election, Letwin was given overall responsibility for the Cabinet Office and became a full member of the Cabinet in the Conservative government. He had previously been Minister of State for Government Policy from 2010 and 2015.

He was also Chairman of the Conservative Research Department and chaired the Conservative Party's Policy Review from 2005 to 2010.

His time in office has not been void of controversy.

In 2009, Mr Letwin was criticised as part of the MP expenses scandal, after he claimed £2,000 from the taxpayer to fix a leaking pipe under his tennis court.

Records showed that in September 200, an invoice for £2,145 was submitted by Mr Letwin for “works ... to lay a new 25mm pipeline to replace the existing leaking pipeline under the tennis court”. The contractors also charged to re-lay the “turfs ... as practical on the sensitive area [around the tennis court].”

In 2011, he came under fire after being snapped throwing constituents' letters in a park bin.

The Daily Mirror reported that he had thrown out more than 100 papers in St James's Park.

Mr Letwin said he had not thrown out government or classified papers, but apologised to constituents.

In 2015, it was revealed through newly-released Downing Street files that Mr Letwin had lobbied for poll tax.

The papers show that then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was warned about the "catastrophic" political consequences of the policy but Mr Letwin's intervention appears to have guided her decision to trial the Charge in Scotland in 1989 and roll it out nationwide in 1990.

Earlier this year, an online petition was launched calling for Mr Letwin to stand down after comments he made following the Broadwater Farm riots in 1985.

Files released by the National Archives showed Mr Letwin – then an adviser in Margaret Thatcher’s No 10 policy unit – blamed “bad moral attitudes” for a series of major disturbances which broke out across mainly black inner city areas.

In an outspoken memorandum to the PM, he poured scorn on claims that the unrest was the product of urban deprivation, saying white communities had endured such conditions for decades without rioting.

He also dismissed proposals by ministers to foster a new class of black entrepreneurs, saying they would simply set up in the “disco and drug trade”.

Mr Letwin apologised unreservedly for the comments, saying they were both 'badly worded and wrong'.